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Reviewed by Jack Magnus for Readers’ Favorite

Deceit is a private investigator mystery written by Mark McGinn.
Clay Tempero is a suspended Australian attorney who’s working as a private investigator until his suspension is lifted. Some of his work is of the tawdry variety and involves catching spouses in illicit affairs. When one client retains him to catch her spouse cheating, Clay figures it’s a routine job until he bursts in on the cheating spouse and sees that his sex partner is actually an underage boy.

This strikes a chord for the private eye who still is cautious about men’s rooms after an incident that happened while he was a child. Clay’s friend, attorney Sean O’Keeffe, has been giving him work when he can. His newest assignment is helping craft a defense strategy for Lou Blanc, a pop singer who’s been charged in connection with the disappearance of her little boy.

Mark McGinn’s private investigator novel, Deceit, is dark, gritty and intense. Clay Tempero is the perfect noir detective, who lives lean, and whose relations with his father and daughter are strained, to say the least. McGinn’s story is taut and atmospheric, and his writing style fits the story perfectly.

As I was reading Deceit, I started wondering if there were other Clay Tempero novels around or planned, as a series is sure to be a welcome addition for any mystery buff’s bookshelf. Deceit delivers action, suspense and an insider’s look into politics, law and life Down Under.

It is most highly recommended!

Chapter 1

An axe bursts through the wall, splintering plasterboard and sending a shockwave through Clay Tempero’s room. The brutality invites a sliver of morning light to catch dust motes and turn the glint of the steel blade into something theatrical.

On the other side, Des Tallon’s voice booms, ‘Renovations started. Back later.’

Clay leans back in his chair, unfazed by the axe. He’s focusing on an email he’s trying to compose. The ceiling fan is letting him down again, grinding away, shifting hot air, not cooling it. Spring, and already unbearable. What fresh hell will the 2016 summer bring?

The PC monitor flickers—a technological nervous tic. Experience suggests it’s close to another mechanical aneurysm.

Bugger it.

Not for the first time, thoughts of his daughter, Kylie, are in his head. It’s probably because she’s just turned 18. He doesn’t want to count the birthdays he’s missed. She was 2 when he left the marriage – if you could call it that. And in the time since, while he’s her dad in his heart, that’s never translated into anything useful for her. Sporadic visits haven’t amounted to fatherhood, much less a relationship.

Forget the email. Call O’Keeffe instead.

His hand hovers over the phone. His friend and lawyer answers before Clay’s thoughts are properly formed. ‘Listen mate,’ Clay says, ‘these reinstatement papers – your questions, the office situation here is piss poor.’

As if O’Keeffe had anticipated Clay’s stress, he says, ‘Just tell me what’s important – why you should regain your practicing certificate. I’ll record it.’

‘Where do you start with an existential question? Do I need to say I’ve been a fuckwit without using the word?’

‘I can dress that up. We know why. Go on.’

‘The law means everything to me, well almost.’ The statement catches in his throat – the reason behind the lost opportunities, no one to blame but himself. ‘Hang on.’  He forces a cough, glad O’Keeffe can’t see his welling eyes. ‘Sorry, throat tickle. Justice might top it. Point is, the last six years chasing adulterers, has put bread on the table. But it’s white, and 2-days old, if you get my drift. None of your fancy ciabatta. No life, is it?’

O’Keefe says, ‘Not much of one, no. I’d die if I couldn’t have…’

‘Alright. You know what I mean. I’ve lost something I worked hard to get.

Battling for the underdog. That’s what I want to do and this fit and proper person yardstick the law society applies…’

He stops himself, looks at the little faded pic of Kylie starting school. ‘All I can say is I’ve learnt some tough lessons, kept my nose clean in some trying circumstances. Maybe you can dream up some other proof. My yearning for it won’t be enough, that much I know.’

‘The F & P test can only apply to what you’ve been doing in the three years since disbarment. So, we’re talking about a private detective’s ability to maintain good client relationships of integrity, plus organisation skills, reliability, conscientiousness and all that crap we lawyers are supposed to be good at. Without stretching a point, we can say that your knowledge of evidence law, whilst not in the realm of legal advice, has kept that part of your brain active too.’

‘Encouraging.’

‘We’ll get there,’ O’Keeffe says, an assurance accompanied by forced cheer. ‘Good character references won’t be in short supply, I’m sure.’

They end the call on the positive note.

From three floors below, the tandoor’s fragrant spice sneaks through his poorly insulated windows. A wrinkled water bottle, once refreshing, now provides a warm necessity.

Next month’s accounts and budget work can’t be put off. Sort out who owes what. Sirens, ubiquitous across the city of Sydney, slice through other street noise and provide another claw into his concentration. They’re nearby. Two police cars and an ambulance mount the Oxford Street curb.

Moments later, two breathless uniformed police officers barrel through his door, Glocks drawn. Far too young to be carrying lethal weapons.

‘You okay, sir?’ the older one asks.

Clay blinks. ‘Nothing a cold beer wouldn’t fix.’

The younger one glances at the axe wedged in the wall. ‘We got a report of a man threatening people with a weapon on this floor.’

Des must have taken the city’s slowest lift down while the cops sprinted up the stairs. Wouldn’t put it past him to have made the call himself.

‘Depends on your perspective, officer. I’d say he’s livened up the place.

Their eyes follow his finger.

‘You know who did this?’

‘A mate – at my request.’ Clay smirks. ‘Built like a brick dunny. Hard to miss.’

The cops exchange glances, signs of frustration. Guns holstered – they release tension from their shoulders.

‘I didn’t summon you,’ Clay says. ‘I hope that’s obvious.’

The younger cop nods in the direction of the axe. ‘Where’d he go?’

The drama’s over. Des doesn’t need a visit from these guys.

‘Tradies. You know what they’re like. Their own farts send them running for a smoko.’

***

In the following three days, Des and his crew had done him proud—as proud as a cash-strapped PI could be. It fell well short of digs to rave about. Creative realtors might conjure words, a twist on cozy, but it was his – for now. Des had under-promised and over-delivered, something Clay wanted to be better at.

The phone’s sharp trill drags him away from the hum of the street below. The caller ID makes him shut his eyes and exhale.

‘Tempero,’ he says, syllables clipped.

‘He’s with the slut tonight, Clay. The bastard’s got it all organised.’

Yvonne Hassett’s voice, touch of old Sydney clinging to her vowels, cloaks her words in self-righteous certainty, the same false assuredness he used to hear in courtrooms – at a time when he had a place there.

Clay leans back, taps fingers on his desk. The ceiling reveals a single crack running from one corner to another, like the slow-moving fault line in his life. The photo she’d sent earlier lingers in his mind. Something about her philandering husband had stirred unease, but the synapses connection still hasn’t come, an itch, out of reach.

Most clients want to size him up in person, see what they’re paying for. Not Yvonne – a client who prefers distance. No problem. The upfront deposit she transferred soothed concerns about her reluctance to meet face to face – at first.

This is now her third call this week and he twists in his ergo chair, challenged by how to balance her urgency against his creeping impatience.

‘Are you sure this time?’ he asks. ‘Monday, you were certain, remember? Wednesday, you were positive, yet…’

‘This time it’s different, Clay. It’s his secretary.’ She says the word like she’s discovered a new ally. ‘She’s tipped me off, disgusted with his lies.’

The personality of the aggrieved secretary – a type Clay knows well. To keep the salary coming, they tolerate a boss’s arrogance, until one day, something shifts. Maybe guilt at enabling shitty behaviour, abject boredom, the thrill of betrayal – working both sides of an ugly street. Maybe all three.

‘Didn’t you say earlier he’d given some staff pay rises?’

‘What’s that got to do with him shagging the slut.

He doesn’t say, ‘Everything’. Yvonne Hassett is a little naïve about game playing. People don’t turn on each other without a reason. Sometimes it’s personal. More often, it’s money. Does he spell out the secretary’s reaction to not getting a pay rise? No. It might have nothing to do with office politics.

‘Maybe nothing,’ he says. Where and when?’

‘Ramada Towers. Seven – thirty.’

Clay glances at his watch. Half an hour.

The word ‘no’ is in his mouth.

That answer would require returning Yvonne’s deposit and bugger his budget.

Eyes shut tight, he says, ‘Fine, back to you tonight.’ The thought about over-promising returns. ‘That’s assuming it works out this time, Yvonne.’

There’s a pause, ended by a sharp edge, ‘Promise me you’ll go, Clay. This is the good oil.’

The racing expression, coming from her, might be more oily than good. ‘Sure. No worries.’

Favouring the stairs ahead of a lift slower than Sydney traffic on a long weekend, he scrolls in his contacts to Des. Outside, the air is redolent with scents of Asian food, sullied by smoked dope and exhaust fumes.

Despite the unlikely miasma, the twenty-five-minute stroll to Paddington isn’t a bad way to clear his head. Public transport is out of the question. The Proclaimers 500-mile walk is preferable to the steps it takes to board one of the buses skulking around his neighbourhood. Trains are grim enough, but he’ll take them if it means avoiding the city’s extortionate parking fees.

***

Clay waits for Des to answer his call. Two men hover near the doorway of the party pill shop. Clad in black leather jackets and jeans, they’re trying and failing to appear inconspicuous. Cops. One has slicked-back hair catching the last of the day’s light – the other’s head is a polished dome reflecting it.

Clay catches Dome Head’s eye. The man turns away, tries to make it casual.

‘Tallon.’

‘Rostered on tonight, mate?’

Des grunts. ‘Is the Pope Catholic?’ His voice has the quality of sandpaper – thick grade.

‘Argentinian, I believe.’

Clay steps off the curb, weaves past a group of tourists, their laughter too bright for this part of town. They should be down at The Rocks, Circular Quay or the Opera House, where he’d prefer to be. Even Hyde Park was dodgy in a way it didn’t used to be a few years ago.

‘Heading your way and in need of a favour.’

Des, as always, is attentive to the plan. In prison, he’d been Clay’s buffer, the kind of man whose sheer presence made threats dissolve before they could form. Their bond was simple – a love of cricket.

By daylight, Des reduces buildings to rubble. Wielding an axe was his mate at his nuanced best. By night, he kept the peace at Ramada Towers, a job that required a man too large to be challenged and too smart to start anything himself.

‘Can you make sure Hassett’s in a suite where there’s an adjoining door,’ Clay asks.’

‘Yep. But unlikely he’s using his real name, right?’

‘Agreed. Photo of the infidel on its way.’

***

The Ramada’s hallway floor covering is a swirling pattern of reds and oranges that someone, at some point, must have thought looked sophisticated. At Uni, Clay had worked evening hours in a factory where he calculated the weight of pile yarn in a unit volume of carpet. He felt qualified to comment on the outcome of production. This one was vomitus.

Through reception, Des was waiting at the lifts, a looming figure in a shirt that might once have propelled craft in Sydney Harbour.

Clay reaches him, and Des holds out a keycard revealing a faded tattoo – an anchor, on his forearm. ‘Gets you in the room and through the adjoining door,’ Des says. ‘One-way access. Got it?’

‘Cheers, mate.’

Des tells him the floor and suite number. ‘The woman hasn’t arrived – not yet.’

Frustration tightens Clay’s chest. ‘Apparently I have the oil from the client this time.’

‘Customer’s never wrong.’

‘Tired of this shit,’ Clay mutters. ‘The holes in my empathy bucket broaden by the day.’

Des flashes his gap-toothed grin. ‘Not your natural vocation, mate?’

‘You think?’

‘Help yourself to the minibar. Might brighten you up. I’ll add it to the prick’s bill.’

Clay takes the lift, follows Des’s instructions and arrives in a fancy room. The headboard is Tudor style, bedspread gold to match the curtains. All too pristine for a place like this.

In an armchair, he fiddles with his Canon SLR, adjusts the settings, checks the light. The last thing he needs is another botched job – another wasted night with nothing to show for it. That wouldn’t pass the fit and proper test.

An ear to the adjoining door – nothing. So much for a quick commando job – enter, snap a few photos, exit, send an invoice.

In seconds, the sound of a creak – Hassett’s door opening, his voice and a woman’s soft reply – both unintelligible until he says, ‘Champagne? Easier for you than the hard stuff, yeah?’

A cork pops. A laptop chimes and Clay frowns.

Who brings a computer to a hotel room when there’s plenty of porn on the TV?

Hassett again – ‘Over here for lines. Leave the bag out. We’ll do more later.’

The woman says something inaudible, followed by, ‘account number’.

Not just infidelity.

This is something bigger. Dirtier.

A shoe tumbles to the floor. Clay imagines the rustle of clothing as it shifts against skin.

Wait, let them get comfortable, naked.

‘Hassett’s sounds of pleasure are the green light. In perfect silence, Clay slides the card into the lock.

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